


autumnal

by prongs117



Category: The Little Mermaid (1989)
Genre: Child Death, F/M, Loss of Virginity, Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-05
Updated: 2018-04-26
Packaged: 2019-03-27 13:37:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 4,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13881984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prongs117/pseuds/prongs117
Summary: He always wondered when he would lose her.





	1. Chapter 1

Ariel supposed she was spoiled. As Triton’s daughter, she always had everything she ever needed. Maybe she wanted more, something outside of the life of a princess but she never experienced insecurity about her future or her place in it.

Now, alone in her strange bed in a strange room in a strange place, for the first time in her life she wondered, _what is to become of her?_

She made the bargain with the sea witch without fully understanding what it really meant. She could lose everything, forever. _And for what? The chance to be rejected by a land-dwelling prince who could not even remember her?_

No. For the chance to see their world, walk their streets and breathe their air, she reminded herself firmly. But deep down she realized the rashness of her actions. 

She had made mistakes in the past but her father would eventually forgive her or her sisters helped her out of whatever mess she had gotten herself into. But now there are no fond sisters or an indulgent father to look out for her. However wonderful this new world might be, it would not do her any good if she loses herself.

With these troubled thoughts, Ariel drifted to sleep. Eventually she dreams of crashing waves and jagged cliffs under a brooding sky.

________________________________________

As a prince, Eric was accustomed to routine and order. His whole life had been one predictable pattern. Dull perhaps but comforting. He never knew how much he needed that predictability until he nearly died and was saved by… _someone_?

He felt like a different person now, he didn’t quite fit in this skin anymore and cannot figure out why. If he only could remember who or what saved him then maybe he could go back, be the predictable and well-liked prince.

Then there was the girl. Ariel. She was a strange one, found walking on the shore just outside the castle walls dressed in rags, unable to speak yet carried herself like a lady. Eric supposed that was the reason he was taking an interest in her. He was the one who found her, yes, but he could have handed her off to the servants and nobody would think him uncaring. In fact, it would have been more proper to do so. A prince of marriageable age like himself could not afford to be seen dallying with strange women. 

But he could not find it in his heart to do just abandon her to the castle’s orderly charities, however kind they might be. He worried she might run away or get lost or be forgotten since she was so quiet. Somehow he can’t bear the thought of her being forgotten.


	2. Chapter 2

He woke up to the sight of Ariel standing on the terrace outside their bedroom, overlooking the sea. The moon was full tonight, its light glinting on the mirror-bright surface and on Ariel’s burnished hair. It was such a fantastic sight that Eric thought he must still be dreaming until he felt the cold breeze from the open window.

“Ariel? What is it?”

She looked at him for a moment then went on gazing at the moonlit expanse in front of her. There were times in their brief and eventful courtship when it would come as a shock to Eric to realize how profoundly strange she was because sometimes it was so easy for him to forget that she wasn’t born human, that there are parts about her he knew he would never understand.

Looking at her now, standing barefoot in her white nightgown fluttering in the sea breeze, it occurred to him for the first time how easily she could slip through his fingers and leave him alone forever. Leaving did not seem to be in Ariel’s mind however as she looked back at him and smiled sweetly, as if her strange mood had passed.

“It’s nothing, Eric. Go back to sleep.”

Eric however did not forget this moment. It felt like a warning, the sea will not so easily relinquish one of its own without taking anything in return.

________________________________________

 

Ariel never doubted for a moment that she loved her husband. She did not regret marrying him and leaving home behind. After all, she knew one can never really leave anything as vast and marvelous as the sea. She was surrounded in it after all, even in this stone castle with its stone walls, built to keep out the encroaching sea but also embrace it. Every morning she would wake up to the sound of crying gulls and the crashing waves.

Every night she would listen to Eric recount his discussions with his ministers on trade and shipping routes, of the cost of ship-building and the latest navigation techniques. 

Living in her husband’s kingdom, she has become aware of how far her father’s rule actually reaches and how eagerly these land-bound princes and kings seek to master that domain. 

She could not blame them, she was aware of the riches gained from plying trade across distant lands but she was worried about how far their greed would reach and what the consequences would be.


	3. Chapter 3

Things had not gone well during the state banquet. This was not the first time he had hosted such an event since his marriage but this one was more well-attended and as such, there was more pressure on Ariel to be the polished and charming consort of a respected ruler.

As a princess in her own right (albeit in kingdom not recognized by the attendant nobles and envoys), Ariel was familiar with her duties but she was not used to well-dressed dignitaries staring at her with ill-disguised curiosity. Eric knew his peculiar marriage has not escaped the notice of his neighbours, allies and rivals alike.

No doubt many thought that the young prince’s head was turned by such a beauty, enchanted even. The more malicious ones viewed it as a sign that the diligent and steadfast prince was no better than a lovesick fool. He might have a reputation as an affable young man of average mental capacity, the untested leader of a small port kingdom, but those who made the mistake of underestimating him realized to their cost he was more well-informed and calculating then he let on.

He knew how difficult it must be for Ariel to be made to feel her origins were something to be ashamed about, the majestic palace she grew up in treated like a hovel, unfit for a proper young lady, let alone a princess. He could not always protect her from situations like these but he also was not going to leave her to the wolves.

This would have been fine except that some of these nobles think one should not discuss state business with a woman present. Eric would have laughed at such antiquated notions if he didn’t know how serious these stuffy men are and how much their goodwill was essential to the continued prosperity of his kingdom.

________________________________________

 

Ariel thought this latest reception was the most tiresome one she had yet to endure and she had been through countless ones as a king’s daughter. It did not help that Eric insisted on hovering over her from a misguided sense of chivalry.

She was aware he meant it for her benefit but she did not appreciate being made to feel like a one of those delicate porcelain dolls she collected in her underwater cavern, so fragile to natural elements. After being married to him these brief months, living in his castle and being privy to his every mood and habit, Ariel has come to realize something in Eric’s character that would perhaps explain why he went out of his way to help a strange ragged girl who appeared out of nowhere.

One of the first things she learned about him was that he had accumulated quite a collection of stray animals in the castle. Dogs, turtles, geese, half a dozen cats and a handful of rabbits. Max, she found out, was an orphaned puppy he met in the stables one afternoon, shivering and covered in hay. Eric loved strays, he felt protective of them.

Another thing she learned is that for all that he lived his entire life a prince, Eric was still learning to live with the privileges and burdens that come with the title. He once told her that half a dozen boys around his age, all sons of nobility, were sent to live with him in this castle but he never struck up any lasting friendships because they never made him forget he was their prince and therefore not their equal.

Putting all this together, Ariel felt quite lucky to grow up surrounded by her sisters. Eric, she surmised, had never grown up with a real friend and had developed an attitude of protectiveness to those close to him and grave formality to others. This was not necessarily a bad thing until it interfered with one’s duties as a prince.


	4. Chapter 4

He always wondered when he would lose her. It wasn’t a pleasant thing to think about but he grew up around tales of elusive sirens who leave tragedy in their wake. 

He starts to think of every sunset as a victory, starts counting the days he spends with her like pearls he can keep away in a box. He is ashamed of these thoughts so he never tells Ariel. 

He remembers the first time they made love. It wasn’t on their wedding night, contrary to popular belief. That night Ariel irrevocably bid farewell to her beloved father and her adored sisters. She was getting everything she ever wanted but at such a heavy price. There was too much emotion to sort out. No, it couldn’t have happened that night. 

It happened a few days later, on a small castle further inland, part of the dowry of some distant ancestor. Grimsby insisted they go on a honeymoon, it was tradition. Though there were many urgent matters to attend to, Eric agreed. He wanted to spend time with his new bride too, away from the curious prying eyes of the court. He picked the castle for its seclusion and convenience.

He was unpacking the trunks they had brought with them and at the bottom he found the engraved case containing a magnificent necklace meant for Ariel. It was belonged to his mother but the emerald gems seemed more suited to his fiery-haired bride. 

He went out looking for her, knowing she was fond of going for a walk in the mornings in the half-ruined garden on the grounds. He couldn’t find any sign of her outside so he tried all the rooms. For some reason, he started to panic, _What if she was gone?_

Aside from a cook who came in once a day to prepare their meals, nobody else was there. He couldn’t ask anyone if they had seen her. To his surprise he found her on their sitting room, _writing a letter? That couldn’t be right, who would she be writing to?_ But at the time he didn’t really question it. He didn’t realize he was out of breath until she looked at him, puzzled at his harried expression.

“Eric, what is it? Are you all right?”

He was starting to feel embarrassed for his premature alarm. “It’s nothing. I didn’t realize you were here…I—I have a present.”

He held out the intricately carved box to her. She only looked at it.

“Open it,” he told her. She might think the box _was_ the present.

When she lifted the lid and saw the necklace lying there, cradled in the softest velvet, a treasure as precious as anything in her underwater cavern, she was speechless. 

“Don’t you like it?”

“Oh, it’s beautiful, Eric. It’s…you didn’t have to.”

He smiled. “If you say so. But it’s yours anyway.”

“May I?”, he asked, removing the necklace from its bed and opening the clasp.

She lifted her hair and he placed the jewels around her, arranging it just so, to lie directly on her skin and closed the clasp. With this task done, he still lingered there behind her. She let her hair fall cascade down her back again so that his next words were almost muffled, leaning as close to her as he was.

“You’re not wearing a corset today.” He didn’t know why he said that. It was true, she wasn’t wearing any but if he wasn’t feeling rather stupid at the moment, he would have thought that was a rather rude observation to share.

“I’m not.” She turned around to look at him with that infinite patience in her eyes, wanting to communicate something with those words, waiting for him to do _something_. 

“Grimsby and Carlotta would be scandalized.” He didn’t know why he said that either but he was becoming so overwhelmed by her closeness and the thought of her skin beneath her thin muslin dress that he couldn’t concentrate on his words anymore.

“They’re not here, Eric. It’s just us.” 

“No, they’re not.” He breathed, moving closer. He wanted to kiss her but suddenly felt rather shy. He felt they were standing on the edge of a precipice which he very much wanted to jump but had to ascertain that she also wanted it as much as he did. Her look gave him the answer he needed.

“May I?”, he asked for the second time that day. Only this time, he was asking something else entirely.

Ariel nodded.

He closed the gap between them and kissed her lips, slowly and tenderly at first until imperceptibly, it became more impatient and urgent. They had never kissed this way before and he knew then that they had jumped and clinging to each other in the fall. When he moved to unclasp the jewels around her throat, she pressed them closer to her and shook her head. He shrugged and continued kissing her, his hands feeling the cold emeralds becoming warm against her skin.

After that, they didn’t talk anymore. They communicated entirely by gestures, sighs, caresses and kisses. When Eric looked back on it, he would always remember that she was wearing the necklace the whole time.

Later, much later, when she was lying in his arms, the afternoon sun spilling golden sunlight on their tangled bodies, she told him a story.

She told him an old legend of mermaids who sought the love of mortals to gain a soul. Those who succeeded would obtain a piece of their beloved’s soul to be theirs forever. Those who failed, well, she shuddered. They would be doomed.

“If the stories are true, I would have a part of your soul right now.”

“You can have all of it. And my heart besides. They will always be yours,” he told her sincerely, gazing at her beside him clad in nothing but jewels that made her eyes the color of the deepest ocean. He had said it in a haze of love and ecstasy but he meant every word of it.

Now, he knows it was still true. They were all hers.


	5. Chapter 5

She was usually up earlier than him. It was her habit to be awake before the sun rises and go down to the shore to watch flocks of seagulls rouse themselves to plague the fishermen and other early risers as the sea slowly catches fire from the rising sun. Merpeople and other sea-folk don’t have the notion on sunsets and sunrises but she was always mesmerized by them. Even more so now that she can watch it to her heart’s content.

Today however, she waited for her husband to wake up. It was just after dawn and he looked so calm and peaceful in his sleep that she decided she could linger in bed and read one of the books she has borrowed from the castle library. But after two chapters she felt too nervous to concentrate any longer that she decided to wake him herself.

The task proved more difficult than she thought it would be that she was grimly considering dousing him with water from the jug by her bed when he finally turned over and yawned, rubbing sleep from his eyes.

“Wha—what? ,” he mumbled. Then, “what time is it?”

“I don’t know. Seven, perhaps. It’s early.“

“Oh good. Wait—did something happen? Did Grim send for me?,” he sat up immediately and looked around the room as if expecting his majordomo to materialize behind the bed curtains.

“No, no, Grim’s not here.” She didn’t think Eric would be this agitated this early in the morning. She was starting to second-guess her decision to tell him her news when he was clearly still tired. It could not be helped however since they were both present and she would rather do this sooner than later.

“It’s me. I have something rather important to tell you.”

Eric must have sensed the gravity of her tone because he quickly sat up. There was an alarmed look on his face that Ariel wondered what kind of news he must have been expecting. She herself was not sure how she felt about what she had to say next.

“I have to tell you that, well, at least they told me—well, Carlotta did assure me…as you know, well you probably don’t, I don’t have much experience in this matters…“, she broke off, trying to gather her thought to at least form a coherent sentence. She didn’t think it would be this fraught to tell a husband something that would be entirely natural given the circumstances. 

“Ariel, what? It’s all right, whatever it is,” he said soothingly, rubbing her shoulder.

She took a breath and rushed out her next words, “I’m—how do you humans say it—having a child?” she said uncertainly. “Yes, that’s how Carlotta said it. Having a child.” Finishing with this, she waited for Eric’s reaction.

He had to replay Ariel’s words in his head twice to make sure he understood her perfectly. Then he sighed with relief. The reaction was not lost on Ariel that wondered what Eric thought she was going to say.

Then he laughed. Then he tried to hug her and kiss her at the same time which ended up in them becoming tangled in the bed covers.

Ariel wasn’t sure how human husbands usually reacted to the news that they were about to become fathers but she decided she liked hearing Eric’s carefree laugh. She liked it very much that completely forgot why she hesitated to tell him in the first place. All she could see at that moment was how happy she made him and how much she wanted to stay there forever, safe in the warm cocoon of their bed with the man she defied the gods of the sea to be with.


	6. Chapter 6

_The kingdom was finally to have an heir._ Or so the rumour around the castle went when just before midnight, the princess' birthing pains started. However what should have been a moment of joy and triumph became one of tragedy.

After an agonizing fourteen hours for Ariel, their child, a boy, was born dead. Eric was torn between grief and sadness for their short-lived son and overwhelming relief that his wife survived the trials of childbirth. The first time he visited her after the birth was the first time he ever saw Ariel cry. At first he thought it was very strange that he had never seen his wife cry all this time but when he called to mind their brief married life, he could see why. They had been so happy together even from the first when they barely knew each other. He had almost taken it for granted, that happiness.

The dead child lay like a chasm between them. Neither of them could find the words to talk about him. How do they talk about someone who was supposed to be a part of them but they never knew?

When the doctor advised her to stay in bed a few more days to recover from her ordeal, she agreed. She chafed at the enforced inactivity when she knew it would not change anything but she didn't want to give her husband any more reason to fret about her. He had a desk moved to their sitting room and he brought his papers and ledgers and maps there so he could work while keeping an eye on her.

 

* * *

 

Ariel could sense Eric observing her from the open door of his makeshift study. She wished he would stop hovering. She could feel his worry and anxiety and care and love, so much love that sometimes it overwhelmed her because she does not know what to do with it right now.

She could remember a time when that wasn’t the case and it was not too long ago. She could remember her absolute joy at finding someone who saw her for what she was and didn’t ask her to be any different. She could remember because it was they first time they made love.

Unlike her husband who remembered the event in a slow dreamy haze, she could recall it quite vividly, every detail and sensation sharp and clear in her memory.

She remembered being puzzled on their wedding night when Eric made no move to touch her. She was not ignorant of what went on between husbands and wives and Carlotta had taken her aside before her wedding to gently explain to her what to expect. She appreciated Carlotta’s thoughtfulness but it was not necessary, not really. She was told it was normal for women to have fears about their wedding night, fear of the unknown, of brutality, of male violence. Ariel conceded that might be true, she had seen enough on land and sea to warrant it but when she looked at Eric, she could not imagine anything to fear from _him_.

She remembered him approaching her with his mother’s jewels, his nonsensical comments, the kiss and finally his question.

She remembered his fingers slowly unlacing her white day dress. How slowly and methodically he unraveled the laces, as if prolonging the moment, measuring it out, and treasuring it. She remembered shuddering at the feel of his hand on her back and wanting more of that touch. When at last, she stepped off her skirt and he removed her chemise, she remembered his sharp intake of breath behind her. The light kiss just below her ear and the shy slight brush of his hand on her breast, as if wanting to know what it felt like but allowing himself only this slight indulgence for now. She shivered in anticipation.

She did not remove the jewels on her neck because they made her feel beautiful and powerful. She wanted to feel powerful even as she wanted to melt. She remembered standing naked and wanting in her pellucid sea-blessed glory in front of him and how his eyes widened and the slight sound of awe he made. As if he hadn’t quite expected what he now saw of his wife.

She remembered when he stepped close to her to kiss her lips, she stopped him with a hand on his chest and nodded toward his attire, for he was still fully clothed.

He understood what she wanted and moved to unbutton his shirt. She stopped him again and moved to unbutton them herself, as slowly and deliberately as he had unlaced as her dress. She looked at his eyes the entire time and remembered how dilated his pupils were, how naked was the desire in them. She knew he could see the same in hers.

When at last they stumbled to the bed, she remembered how his hands touched every part of her, how different he was now from the hesitant youth not an hour ago. She remembered touching him too, his body so different from hers, and when she looked at him then, his eyes flashing, she remembered thinking what kind of king he would have become if he lusted after wealth and glory. As it was, all he wanted to conquer was her and he was willing to offer himself, bare and vulnerable, in return. A trade she was happy to comply with.

After, she looked at his sleeping form, and thinking how strange it was that just a day before this man, despite his love for her, still kept her at a distance by his exquisite politeness. As if the only way he knew to express his love was by being his most courtly and proper self. And now he had seen and touched every inch of her skin, and she him.

She remembered knowing then how this day would irrevocably change them. She knew she had just been transformed again but this time, he was transformed along with her.


End file.
